Pressure sensitive adhesives that adhere to wet or moist surfaces, so-called “wet-stick” adhesives, are useful in selected industrial, commercial and consumer applications. In pharmaceutical and other medical fields, such wet-stick adhesives are typically used for adhering articles such as tapes, bandages, dressings, and drapes to moist skin surfaces such as wounds or areas of the body prone to moistness. Wet-stick adhesives also find use in outdoor or exterior applications, such as on roadway materials, traffic control signage, and marine or automotive coatings and surfaces. Labels for food containers and other products that are exposed to moisture due to condensation or subjected to water or ice immersion also must be coated with wet-stick adhesives.
(Meth)acrylate pressure sensitive adhesives are attractive materials for many tape and label applications. (Meth)acrylates are known for their optical clarity, oxidative resistance and inherently tacky nature. Inherently tacky (meth)acrylate pressure sensitive adhesives (i.e., materials that require no additives such as tackifying resins) are typically formulated predominately from acrylic acid ester monomers of non tertiary alcohols. Examples of such monomers include n-butyl acrylate, 2-ethylhexyl acrylate, isooctyl acrylate, isononyl acrylate, isodecyl acrylate and dodecyl acrylate. When these (meth)acrylate monomers are polymerized, the homopolymers have a glass transition temperature (Tg) of less than 0° C. This low Tg is a necessary property in (meth)acrylate materials that exhibit tack at room temperature. Such (meth)acrylate polymers are hydrophobic in nature and, without modification, are generally unsuitable as wet-stick adhesives.
A means to increase the hydrophilic character of (meth)acrylate polymers is to copolymerize the (meth)acrylate monomers with hydrophilic acidic comonomers, such as acrylic acid, methacrylic acid, beta-carboxyethyl acrylate, itaconic acid, sulfoethyl acrylate and the like. Addition of these hydrophilic acidic comonomers in minor amounts (about 1 to about 15 wt %) can also enhance the internal or cohesive strength of the PSA. This increased polymer reinforcement, however, can diminish the tack of the hydrophilic acidic comonomer-containing (meth)acrylate copolymer.
At higher acidic comonomer levels, (meth)acrylate copolymers can dramatically lose their tack and become highly hydrophilic. When exposed to water, the moisture helps to transform these highly acidic, low tack compositions into tacky materials that are suitable as wet-stick adhesives used in many medical applications. When the water is allowed to evaporate, these adhesives lose their pressure-sensitive tack. Such compositions can also be useful as water-soluble or water dispersible adhesives. Water-dispersible or soluble (meth)acrylate copolymers can be formulated as repulpable adhesives used to splice dry paper rolls and designed to lose adhesive integrity and fully degrade when undergoing paper recycling operations.
When using high levels of acidic comonomers, it is difficult to effectively copolymerize these materials without a solvent, an aqueous reaction medium, or additives that promote interpolymerization of these monomers. Attempts to copolymerize these monomers in the absence of compatibilizing reaction media often results in heterogeneous materials dominated by glassy regions formed by the polymerization of the acidic comonomers and softer domains comprising the polymerized (meth)acrylate monomers. Thus, (meth)acrylate copolymers having high levels of acidic comonomers have traditionally been made using either solvent or water-based polymerization methods.
Such polymerization methods, however, have several drawbacks. Solvent-based processes have become increasingly undesirable because of the environmental and safety considerations associated with the use of solvents. Additionally, although the use of water-based polymerization methods avoids the use of solvents, water-based systems have not been satisfactory in some situations because of the amount of energy required to remove the water from the adhesives once coated and the problems associated with coating such water-based materials on moisture sensitive substrates.